Are Really Small Homes The Future?
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in Energy, Environment, Ethics, Housing, VideoWith Americans defaulting left and right on their McMansions, a new trend is emerging.
NBC investigates…
So, could you live in a house that small? I think I could live in the second one but certainly not the first. That house was ridiculous.
Regardless, I love this “Think Small” trend. Smaller homes, smaller cars and smaller energy use. Goodbye more, more, more and hello maximize, maximize, maximize. This is the way we need to start thinking if we want to become energy independent and choke off the money supply from the terrorists.
But ignoring terrorism for a moment, do know that there will be a lot more of us in the next 50 years, and since many will live in urban centers we’ll do well to start this move towards small sooner rather than later.
UPDATE:
A reader writes…
Justin, if you want to learn about the movement towards smaller/smarter homes, you should check out Susan Susanka’s “The Not So Big House”. (www.notsobighouse.com) It really sparked the public interest in the idea over a decade ago. As an architect, it completely changed the way I think about and design houses.
I checked out the website and I’m genuinely fascinated. The philosophy here is “Built Better, Not Bigger” and I think that type of idea will extend to all facets of our society eventually.
This entry was posted on Friday, October 3rd, 2008 and is filed under Energy, Environment, Ethics, Housing, Video. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
October 3rd, 2008 at 10:57 pm
I’m actually worried more about depopulation than overpopulation in this century. Japan recorded negative population growth for the past 2 years - more deaths than births. This is the first time an industrialized country in peacetime has ever seen this. The native population of European countries such as Spain and Italy halves every generation. The only reason that socialist Europe is able to keep its pension systems solvent is by importing immigrants from more fecund nations. And even those countries have declining Birth rates. In the 1960’s India averaged over 5 kids per woman. Now its down to less than 3 and dropping. 2.1 are required to sustain a population. America just barely surpasses that, but only when you include immigration.
Mark Steyn, who wrote a phenomenal book on this subject called America Alone, once said, “America used to be about making things bigger and better. Now people want to make things smaller and worse.”
October 3rd, 2008 at 11:00 pm
Justin, if you want to learn about the movement towards smaller/smarter homes, you should check out Susan Susanka’s “The Not So Big House”. (www.notsobighouse.com) It really sparked the public interest in the idea over a decade ago. As an architect, it completely changed the way I think about and design houses.
October 4th, 2008 at 12:07 am
Well hey, that’s not necessarily the worst thing for this country’s bottom line. Depopulation will bring about less dependence on government programs, yes? And that can only be a good thing for conservativism.
To explain…
The more people who are born into this American system, the more people we’ll be responsible for taking care of. I mean, universal health care is coming in one way or another, and you know that’s true. Because whether you like it or not, humans simply won’t take full responsibility for their lives, and that’ll ultimately move us towards a much more socialistic brand of governance. So conservatism should move towards a “less people” paradigm if it hopes to survive.
However, this presents a problem. Why? Because Republicans have made a pact with the religious right in the past 30 years, and that was an extremely bad move since it promotes a “more people” philosophy. And again, I’m speaking in strictly philosophical terms here. In practice, I welcome more people, but that will ultimately only bring about more people to take care of, and a personal responsibility philosophy will obviously break in that situation.
Still, because your political movement promoted a more people situation, it has ultimately resulted in the doctrine of “compassionate conservatism” which is pretty much a pseudo-conservative religious liberalism mixed with weak fiscally conservative values. And ultimately we’ve seen this philosophy fail miserably under the weight of real world economic realities.
So what to do?
Go back to a strong, fiscal conservative, Reaganesque paradigm augmented by a libertarian non-intervention foreign policy. That means pursuing an energy independent reality as fast as you can and letting the rest of the world take care of the rest of the world. In other words, no more “world police” once we’ve weened ourselves from the foreign oil teet. And yes, that means goodbye Israel.
Trust me, I see the value of the fiscally conservative ideology, but I also realize the limits. And that philosophy will break in the coming years if it doesn’t adjust to a real world way of thinking. Let the religious right-wing form their own pseudo-liberal faction and let the rest of you go strongly after a fiscally conservative, pro-tax cut stance. It’s the only way you’ll survive.
October 4th, 2008 at 1:27 am
As another Architect reader of your blog, I can also highly recommend Susan Susanka’s books. What she writes about (and illustrates) serves as a great example of where our nation’s housing should be headed. As heating bills, property taxes, and electrical costs go up, and incomes stagnate during this recession, the wisdom of doing more with less space will become more apparent to the average homeowner.
October 4th, 2008 at 9:57 am
No. The opposite is true, particularly if we move into more socialist systems. We accumulate old people, and less younger, working people pay into the system to fill the pensions. We are seeing this slowly happen with social security. This is also why we are seeing Europe slowly evolve into a muslim continent, because most of the workers who need to be imported come from Muslim countries.
Socialist forms of government, therefore, constantly require a growing population, unless they promote euthanaisia for the elderly as social policy. Believe it or not, this is exactly what appears to be happening in parts of Europe as well, where the socialist health care system encourages Doctor assisted suicide, and rationing of “futile care.” Since liberals tend not to have the same religious or spiritual values that conservatives do (as you have pointed out), this isn’t so much an ethical problem for them, just like aborting defective babies that may be a burden to their own lives or the socialist health care system.
I’ll grant you that, but that’s not quite a ringing endorsement of liberalism or socialism, is it? “Human beings are whiny little children: Vote Democrat, we’ll wipe your ass.”
Truly conservative people are the humans who take care of their own lives, who invest for their own future and don’t want other people to take care of them, or the govenment to force them to take care of others. More people are no problem, because they save for their own retirement, and have stronger family values to tie them to their multiple younger proginy.
October 4th, 2008 at 3:36 pm
To address…
First, there are millions upon millions of conservatives who are both religious and pro-choice. It just so happens that the larger majority of them happen to be pro-life. And the same goes for euthanasia, which in other corners is considered highly ethical since many people think they have the right to die with dignity instead of having doctors load them so full of morphine in their last hours because the pain is so intense that they have no idea if they’re even on this planet anymore.
But back to my original point…
I think you’re agreeing that depopulation is much better for conservatism than it is liberalism, right? I get your point about social safety nets needing more money, but that’s backed up by my point about overpopulation being good for Democrats.
Nobody’s talking about endorsements here. Liberalism has obvious faults, not the least of which is cost. But at least it acknowledges the realities and limitations of capitalism and “free” markets.
However, there you go with the nanny nonsense. How about making sure people don’t fall hopelessly in debt because health care costs are insane? How about making sure that somebody who has worked hard their entire life isn’t just left out in the gutter because they may not have the sharpest financial acumen. How about making sure parents don’t have to spend thousands upon thousands of dollars to make sure their kids get a decent education.
What I’m talking about here is fairness. You’ll continue to try and paint Democrats ideas as one step away from Mao, but having a level playing field to start from and then folks can take it from there? Sure.
Well then, I guess there aren’t a lot of “truly” conservative people out there, because there are just as many conservatives who rely on social security and other government run institutions as there are liberals. Look at the HEAVILY subsidized programs in rural America. And unemployment rates are traditionally higher in rural American as well. You know how they get those unemployment rates, right? People are filing for free money.
But still, to the idea that you’re saying more people is no problem because they’ll save more…well, I just don’t think that theory will prove to be correct.
Still, good discussion!
October 4th, 2008 at 8:06 pm
The idea of requiring people to take responsibility for their lives through some sort of legislation is not altogether execrable to conservatives, such as private retirement accounts as part of social security, Romney-style health care, or school vouchers.
They are different approaches to the problem of people who don’t take responsibility for their own lives, without requiring redistribution of wealth, or responsible people footing the bill for irrisponsible people.
If people are forced to pay social security, of course they are going to want to collect. Regarding subsidies, if someone is offered a “free lunch,” of course they are going to take it. The problem is, everyone else outside that guy’s voting district is forced to pay without getting anything in return.
I don’t necessarily think that depopulation benefits conservatives, since the individual’s income reflects his/her outcome. It can sustain itself at any level. Also, conservative economic policy promotes economic growth to create prosperity, rather than wealth redistribution.
Safety nets should be relegated to indigent people or children only, else they become the “free lunches” that personally responsible people end up paying for as well. People who eat too many free lunches get fat and become burdens to the National Health services in Britain, who are now considering legislation which controls what people are allowed to eat. It is a road to serfdom.
October 4th, 2008 at 10:58 pm
Jimmi’s right. Lower or negative population growth would be a disaster for government funding of social programs like medicare and SS. Such programs only work when population grows enough to support a pyramid. There’s no good way around it.
I think little houses are a fantastic idea for all the folks who are delighted by the idea. And while I’ll cheerfully acknowledge that Mcmansions are a step too far beyond what’s sensible and sustainable for most families of average size, I think small houses suck. Plain and simple.
And that doesn’t reflect at all upon the virtue of good design, innovative design, clever design, functional design. I’m all for finding better ways to maximize efficiency in the use of space. How many folks out there have a dining room _and_ a kitchen table. What is this about? Our house was designed to have both, and we adapted it so that we have one big table for all dining.
Ok how many folks have a really good and convenient place to handle the sorting of recyclables? Anyone? Bueller?